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No true love for true north movies

By Bruce DeMaraEntertainment Reporter

Tues., March 25, 2008

Michael Sparaga's latest movie was made for the Canadian Film Fest. Okay, not literally.

But Maple Flavour Films, premiering tomorrow night at the Carlton Cinema – a kind of road-film documentary in the Michael Moore style – pretty much sums up the moribund state of Canadian film and the raison d'être of the festival as it enters its fifth year today.

The movie traces Sparaga's travels from Halifax to Vancouver as he tries to get ordinary Canadians to see his first feature film, a quirky superhero comedy called Sidekick, and to garner media attention – with zero marketing dollars.

Festival director/screenwriter Bern Euler said Sparaga's film and its message are exceedingly apt for inclusion in the five-day event.

"It's near impossible to find a Canadian movie on the big screen in this country. That was one of the reasons I started (the festival)," Euler said.

Along the road – with Sidekick's one and only print in the backseat – Sparaga also picks up public impressions of Canadian film by asking people to name their favourites, as well as the Canadian equivalent of the Oscar. The answers are predictably, depressingly similar. ("Boring." "Can't name one." "Sorry, don't know.")

The festival, which only screens Canadian films, is making headway. Last year's event saw tickets to more than half of the films sell out and filmmakers use the annual event for networking and schmoozing.

But the obstacles remain formidable, Euler said. Canadian films only get about 1 per cent of the total movie-going audience so theatre distributors have little incentive to screen them.

While U.S. films have an average $1 million to spend on promotion, the Canadian average is $33,000. Euler doesn't know even one Canadian filmmaker who spends that much.

There's also the Harper government's tepid support for Telefilm Canada, a major source of funds for filmmakers. The festival gets no government funding at all – despite many requests – because Telefilm, with a frozen budget, can't afford to fund new festivals, even one that exclusively shows Canadian film, said Euler. He calls the situation "extremely frustrating."

Sparaga shares Euler's frustration, but he also targets Canadian filmmakers, who turn up their noses at genres like action movies, horror flicks and light comedies: in other words, the kinds of films Canadians regularly rent or go in droves to theatres to watch.

And while there's "plenty of finger-pointing" in the industry, Sparaga said his film highlights the obvious disconnect.

"I'd rather know the public was saying horrible things about Canadian film but ... they were at least thinking about it rather than nothing. Nothing is the worst; you can't overcome nothing," he added.

To Sparaga, the phenomenon is a cultural puzzle. "People love the Tragically Hip ... they love the National Ballet. In every art form, Canadians actually have quite an impact in their own country, except film," he said.

But Sparaga said his movie is also "very uplifting" because the men and women on the street are proud Canadians who yearn to see more and better Canadian film.

"What they don't want to see is another depressing rural drama," he added.

Euler said this year's lineup will break the "artsy, boring, slow, intellectual" Canadian flick stigma/stereotype, with more than 25 entries, including light comedy, drama, horror, documentary and shorts.

Already generating buzz is Mr. Big, premiering Saturday at noon, a doc by filmmaker Tiffany Burns that exposes a controversial entrapment technique used by the RCMP. It will be introduced by Rubin "Hurricane" Carter, a boxer wrongly convicted of murder.

The fest opens tonight with the gala premiere of Hank & Mike, a comedy, at the Varsity and runs until Saturday.

For information, go to canfilmfest.ca. Tickets are $10 each, cash only, and on sale at theatres before screenings.

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